Friday football digest, week 16
These things I know: You cannot beat Boyle County if you cannot throw the football. And unless Allen County-Scottsville has undergone an incredible transformation in the last six days, it cannot — or is not willing — to throw the football.
Put two plus two together, and it adds up to one — one big win for Boyle.
The Rebels will win their second consecutive Class 4A championship and their seventh title in 12 years largely because they will smother an offense that knows only one way to advance.
AC-S has garnered 85 percent of its offensive yardage in 13 games this season by running the ball, and that just won’t work against Boyle. Two Rockcastle County teams learned that nearly a decade ago when their one-dimensional offense was swallowed up by Boyle teams in the 2001 and ’02 championships, and AC-S will learn it tonight.
The Patriots have certainly earned the right to take their best shot. They completed their second consecutive undefeated season — and only the second in school history — then bounced the Lone Oak team that beat them last year before going toe to toe with Boyle in the title game.
Hometown boy and former Lincoln County assistant coach Brad Hood, who worked under current Boyle coach Larry French for two years at Lincoln, gave up a more lucrative career to join the family business, and he now he works on the same field where he once played as a child while his father coached. Hood has pumped life into the program, and his teams have turned heads and taken names in central and western Kentucky for the last three years.
His Patriots do run the ball, and they do it with two running backs and a quarterback who have combined for somewhere in the neighborhood of 4,000 yards.They do not, however, complement it with a passing game. That same quarterback has attempted only 88 throws, a cool 6.8 per game.
Perhaps defense can keep AC-S in the game, but I just can’t see how the offense can accomplish much against Boyle’s impressive group of linemen and linebackers. Bell County couldn’t do it last week, and the list of teams that have tried and failed gets longer all the time. It grows by one tonight.
The pick:
- Boyle County over Allen County-Scottsville.
Last week: 0-2; season: 58-12 (.829).
